Soul City: Boletaria
by Leider Hosen
Summary: The Historical District, where high business and high technology rule the day. Not that it matters, I'm not a hero, I'm just doing my duty, and trying to bring these beasts to justice... (Rated M for EVERYTHING)


Boletaria.

The Historical district.

The oldest part of the whole city.

The faces of the buildings, all dignified with their fine stonework and 20th century charm, loomed high over the city street, the thin mist of rain settling on the cracked, aged streets reflecting the soft, steady glow of the rustic street lights, darkness and shadow embracing the world like a loving mother.

Even the cars buzzing by, obnoxious music vibrating through the windows, felt old here: like one could turn back the clock a few hundred years just by stepping in and letting all the little, paradoxical anachronisms of present day slip on by. The soft hum of rain echoed up pale brick walls, further detaching the private investigator from reality, though he was bound to bump into it eventually.

Who was he, you ask? He usually went by his initials, J.L., or a number of cute nicknames, but to those who knew him well enough, he was nothing special, just a man named Jason Law.

In this city where time seems to run in one big loop, nothing ever changing save the little things, you'd have to be pretty ballsy, or plain insane to be out at night, in the rain, but for this lone figure it suit him just fine.

He didn't like to show his face, which was now well hidden under the ragged collar of his long, dark coat, his head hanging down to the broken sidewalk. Aside from being plain antisocial, you never know who could be watching, waiting, and you definitely, definitely don't want people to know where you're going, or where you've been for plenty of reasons, especially when you're a private investigator.

Jason sighed, the rain letting up long enough for him to raise his head and admire a chipped, pale green street sign, marking his stop. Without a word he ducked into an alleyway, the utter blackness absorbing his presence and silencing the patter of rain falling on his forlorn figure.

Jason's dark, grey eyes looked about, alert for any thugs or muggers, but found it clear, save an equally shady figure resting against the wall, casually playing with a deck of cards. He looked like he belonged to one of the many shining nightclubs or Casinos with his fine businesswear and calm demeanor, calmly ignoring the investigator as he sat against the wall.

"Got a light?" the P.I. asked politely, the two keeping their eyes averted,

"Depends," the figure replied back, a rare note of cheer in his voice, "What kind of light are we talking?" the two paused as a figure wandered in their direction, their performance going without a hitch as Law shrugged and continued:

"Fuck I don't know, that blasted hyena raped me for all I had. Three years no probation, just need a little pick-me-up."

"Oh I see," the night man shrugged, reaching into his jacket and producing a joint of concentrated Widow Lotus, which he passed over to the investigator, the lowlife giving a condescending smirk as he passed. The night man withdrew the drug, slipping it back in his jacket, "see you again, try not to let it kill ya'." He winked, Jason heading away while the night man started back to Storm Park: a popular ward that housed a large graveyard and plenty of culture.

The investigator emerged into the street, nervously working the thin strip of paper peeled off the edge of the joint, between his thumb and pointer, walking a good while before he was sure no-one had seen the transaction and he wasn't followed.

He'd hate to scare the night man off: he was, afterall, one of Jason's best and most reliable contacts. He went by "The Graverobber", since he was good at digging up information and better at not getting caught.

He'd worked with the Boletaria Police Department for awhile, until a man so high on Soldier Lotus his gunshot wounds sprayed powder forced him into early retirement, though that was another story. Jason'd gotten pretty frosty during his service, and as a result, he knew the best places to look for information and the right kind of people.

That is, bad people who knew bad people and would give him what he needed to know, while polite enough not to shank him the first chance they got.

As the investigator nostalgically thought on that, he looked up to the glimmering monolith in the distance: the tallest building in the district and one of the grandest in the city, overlooking the filth and corruption all around it.

The "Palace" as it was called by most, the Monumental Tower to the big-wigs, was the only thing that still looked brand new: with glimmering white marble edges, chrome, and prism stone searchlights all around to light the place the up like a diamond in the sun, even in the dead of night.

You had to be the highest of high class and lowest of scum to get in: wealth and prosperity, drugs and prostitutes, and power, all beyond imagination awaited those inside.

For those on the outside, good luck to then, they'd need it.

It was all thanks to the Nexus Group, a conglomerate of billion-dollar industries that made Boletaria one of the strongest cities in the world, until they went above the law and never looked back.

"Old Mr. Allant," the chairmen of the whole group, was the one running the show: nothing happened in this historical district without his say so. Not one lowlife would dare step out of their territory, sell a drug, or even spit on the sidewalk without his enforcers allowing it.

There were plenty that saw him as a Saint, spoke fondly of how he funded hospitals, libraries, and plenty of other public works, every channel singing praises to the man who's kept Boletaria strong.

But, the majority were more enlightened than the sad, naïve few: the reminders of how great Allant's good was did little to console the place where the sun never shrines bright enough.

Jason remembered how often Chief Biorr would stay up late at night, running through every rule, every protocol, every possible action that could put the man away. Poor bastard. The department was undermanned and underfunded, most of the laid off cops just went to work for Allant, and no jury in their sane mind would convict. He was truly helpless.

If that wasn't enough, Biorr's brother, Vallarfax, ended up gunned down by one of Allant's finest when he came too close to something big.

The flying dragon twins, the older one to be specific: the meanest, strongest, most vicious bastard in the city next to Allant himself.

Jason Law sighed, facing the sidewalk again as the monument to the city's ruler continued to cut into the darkened sky. Silent and impenetrable.

The investigator wasn't crazy enough to take on the whole city himself, and even if he was, that wasn't his job. He had a particular case to crack, one of the hardest he'd faced. It started about three years ago, when the investigator, a detective who could also handle a gun when need be, was called by a rather odd customer.

Not a merchant, not a courier, no-one of value, just a normal man working in a normal warehouse, "Stockpile" Thomas Wilson.

The man lost his wife and daughter to the local thugs. The mom put up a fight, but there were too many in the end. The two were beaten bad, then drug off, raped, and killed, their bodies hung off the side of a building by chains. Typical classless thug: believing a show of violence will send everyone trembling in their boots.

What wasn't very typical though was the actual cause of death: Jason wasn't a doctor so he couldn't give a very in depth look at the damage, but he knew the final diagnosis: they were harvested to create Manity when the fun was had, the bodies left out to rot.

Of course, Thomas couldn't go to the police with something as big as Manity in the mix, so he hired the best P.I. in the district. Jason Law, ex detective, good with a gun and streetwise as they come.

Sometimes, the PI couldn't help but feel he was born behind his time. Was it too much to ask for a good, simple life without a mob on every corner and lowlife on every street? Oh well, with time this convoluted, you can never tell…

The investigator finally brought himself to read the paper, it didn't have much information, just enough to pick up on the scent, perhaps finally get a lead on the particular grunts responsible for the murder:

_-Storm Park, Golden Crow Bar and Grill. Chef Arbit likes to add a __very__ special ingredient to those who can pay extra and ask politely_

* * *

Jason stepped into yet another ally, the rain finally starting to let up as he went around the side of the building, looking around for any clues as to what could be in the building. Everything had significance to his trained eye: the contents of the dumpster, the background noise, every little thing that could be alert him to danger.

As a P.I. he had some pretty broad freedoms to move around: enforcers working outside the police were almost as dangerous as the mob. But there was always a unique risk in approaching Manity dealers…

The cloaked figure jumped at a loud noise, looking to several cages full of birds, which were letting up a racket now that he'd passed to close. The things were piled around near the dumper, eyeing him as the investigator went towards the back door leading to the kitchen, finding it unlocked and pulling it open, the birds watching him silently.

The creak of the door felt loud, very, very loud as Jason closed it again, feeling for a light switch and flipping the fluorescents on. The hall lit up, the racks of ingredients and boxes materializing from the shadows as he walked along, adrenaline shooting through his body as he fought to control his breathing.

Something wasn't right. Something was very, very, very wrong with this picture, he just couldn't place it. Jason listened out for awhile, hearing nothing but the fall of rain on the ceiling and his own footsteps walking down the hall. It was then he remembered: this restaurant was one of the most popular in Boletaria. And it was open 24 hours a day.

It was _never_ this quiet.

The P.I. reached into his coat, wrapping his white, trembling hands firmly around the grip of his pistol. It was police issue, a little souvenir: an extended, jet black .45 barrel with more stopping power than a truck, and distinct, glowing blue sights at the head. The force had taken to calling it the "blue-eyed knight", only surpassed by the upgraded red-eye model.

A sound begun to rise as Jason worked through the storage rooms, listening out for a voice and praying this "Arbit" hadn't been stupid enough to overdose. You see, Manity was potent stuff: a small amount would make you feel more alive than you ever had before, but too much would cause your genes to break down and mutate. This leads to a variety to unexpected, very unpleasant and unpredictable side effects…

The PI heard more noise, his finger twitching on the hammer of his pistol as he heard some low, insane rambling, and a sickening crunching and smacking of raw meat, Jason speeding up his pace, when another sound entered the mix: the unmistakable sound of struggling.

Jason sped his pace even further, until he was sprinting down the hall, an odd smell reaching him before he swung around the doorway ahead, heaving a little. Arbit, for all intents and purposes, was lost: he was, based on his posture, at least two full heads taller than the investigator, his body swelled to gut wrenching proportions and convulsing with every move, like he'd burst all over the room.

His sweat was caked as thick as lard, his arms and legs looking stubby as fat hung from him, his flesh a sickeningly yellow color. The chef's head, with scrunched features and a tongue flowing from his throat and wrapping around a limb he was gnawing into with insane fervor, was topped with a bloodied chef's hat, a dead bird with a blank, glassy stare fixed down to it with zip tie.

The whole kitchen was splashed with blood, bones and bodies piled up around the room, with many of the bones picked clean. It seemed the pudgy bastard had devoured the whole staff and guests, and in one sitting too, still snorking and gulping as he tore into a leg bone and chewed it down, right to the bone.

The PI slowly drew his gun, drawing the hammer back with his thumb and gripping it firmly. When Manity user's got to this point, it was better to shoot first-

The investigator, in a trance of disgust and panic, jerked over towards the sound of limbs hitting a table, spotting a woman strapped down to a table. She was gaged with a dishcloth, stripped down naked with some blood rubbing on her back, her flailing increasing as the swollen man dropped the bone, running his long tongue over his hands-

"Ma ma ma-" he stuttered, turning on the woman and giving a sudden, stressed jerk, reaching down and heaving something up over his shoulder: a butcher knife the size of a machete he must've made for personal defense. He mumbled to himself for the Nth time he started slavering, his stomach moaning and quaking as his head jerked again and he pressed his bloated hand to his ear, the dead bird bobbing on his head,

"I'm doin it I'm doin it!" he staggered over, his victim panicking and flailing,

"That's close enough!" Jason barked, leveling his gun. The chef turned, seeming to angle his head for the crow to look at him from atop his pudgy head. The man shook,

"Yu- you're no good either," he heaved, bearing his machete like a cleaver, which Jason reckoned was heavier than a sack of cinderblocks. The "judge" stumbled forward, raising his bloody cleaver, Jason's gun going off. The chef staggered back a bit, the skin over his heart splashing but unharmed as the bullet bounced away over the floor.

"Shit." Jason growled, the Manity user charging and throwing his weight into a great swing, the P.I. ducking and feeling the wind waking over his head as the cleaver blew the door of the refrigerator in, crumbling it like a beer can. He drew his arm back as Jason punched him in the jaw, his hand bouncing harmlessly off the skin,

"Shit…" he snapped again, the cleaver flying back around and narrowly missing the fleeing P.I.

Arbit was a tough one…

The judge stumbled forward, swinging his cleaver down and crushing the linoleum, sending gnawed limbs over the room as his other hand clumsily darted out and grabbed the investigator by the throat, lifting the man from his feet and squeezing down.

Jason's head throbbed as the veins were crushed like straws, his pistol whipping the swollen man's head over and over, though it felt like punching a waterbed, nothing got through.

The investigator started to weaken, the judge wrenching down on Jason's neck to suffocate him while shouting more nonsense. Seeing nothing else, the PI did the first thing that came to mind as he faded, whipping his hand across and knocking the stupid bird from the chef's head, the corpse flying across the room and loosely hitting a wall.

The P.I. was dropped instantly,

"Naw naw!" he shouted, throwing everything aside to grab his bird, cradling it in his arms and shaking like mother holding her dropped infant, Jason seizing the moment and producing a tall, thin tube, his finger clicking the top open to dispense a round, tan candy.

He immediately threw it in his mouth, crushing them in his teeth and swallowing the sweet, thick, herbal mixture inside. The effect was instant, the ultra-concentrated medicine shooting Jason with energy and shocking the fog from his head, the PI grabbing his gun and springing to his feet as the Manity user turned. The investigator took a running jump and whipped the bird off the judge's head with the side of his heavy pistol.

Arbit again ran for his precious bird, his madness overriding his common sense as the investigator strafed to the side and squinted down the blue sights at the bird, firing a few rounds off with all the focus he could, the first blowing a hole in the floor, the second breaking the side of his wing, and the final hitting the mark and splattering the corpse over the floor.

"No," The judge collapsed, pounding his meaty hand on the floor and pouring fatty sweat from his eyes, "no no no no no" he panicked, directionless, until he was grabbed by the forehead and pulled back, the investigator shoving the blue-eyed knight down Arbit's throat and firing continually, until the gun clicked to announce its emptiness.

The PI continued to pull the trigger absently a few times, the figure gagging on his own blood and vomit a moment, before the trauma put him down, the bloated figure slumping to the floor and lolling back, dead as it got.

The investigator glanced at his gun, grimacing at its filthiness and sheathing it in its holster, sure he'd need to wash them both for an hour or two to get the muck off.

He reached into his coat again, his bleached hands shaking so bad he nearly dropped the second small tube, the top popping open and letting another small, round candy roll into his hand, this one bright green.

They may have been a little less potent than Lotus or Manity, but at least Moon Lozenges were herbal, legal, and wouldn't destroy his body too bad, the investigator popping a few of the sweet candies and feeling his body starting to relax and cool off after the fight.

He heard a restrained voice, the investigator going to the still tied woman and finding some meat scissors to cut her loose, again marveling at the bloated corpse of the judge and the viscera strewn around him, the stink defying a description.

"Gods, what a mess," he muttered, cutting the dame loose and letting her fall crying into his arms, letting her vent a bit before offering her golden Full Moon Lozenge, which she accepted in kind: her panic subsiding as the powerful herb took effect.

Jason told her to wait there when she was decent, and that he'd be right back, there was something he had to do. He went out the front door, seeing it clear and politely turning the Neon "Open" sign off, sure they wouldn't be seeing any business for a good long time.

The rain kept up a steady pace the whole way down the road, Jason spotting a man-sized glass box on the corner, the top a big black stripe with a familiar, right-facing man lit green in the center.

The phone booth looked to be in business, so Jason stepped in, withdrawing some spare change and paying for ten minutes, in case five wasn't enough, dialing a familiar number and waiting for it to call through, staring at the light reflecting off the rain pattering the side of the glass while the dial rung intermittently.

Jason didn't have much of a soft spot for Nexus, but they commissioned a hell of a telecom network from Geri Technologies, along with many other utilities that, astoundingly, worked very well even in these times.

Made sense. Aside from being the grandest scale of organized crime this side of hell, Allant and his collective forces were complete tech-addicts: they had to be the cutting edge of the cutting edge of everything. If someone made an innovation Nexus couldn't match, they were bought out for triple the going value, and Allant was eager to display their advances to the rest of the city.

Between all their deals, it was becoming increasingly hard to imagine what Nexus _couldn't _do, they already had gene manipulation hammered down with their refined Manity, and a few primitive but powerful computer servers courtesy of Geri Technologies, and a security force to rival the national army with all their military contracts. Hell, some said they dabbling in cloning for their next big venture.

Jason snickered to himself as the connection sluggishly worked through a few operators, since the line was busy quite often. No wonder the district was going to hell: billions and billions spent amassing as much power as possible, and not a single clue how to fix human greed and desire, both of which were blossoming here.

Not just Boletaria, but Soul city as a whole: three districts, three flavors of bad. Jason's reminiscing was cut short by an almost hilariously jovial voice calling back to him:

"Hmm, Jason, is that you?" Biorr boomed in his heavy, sleepy voice, Jason nodding to himself,

"Yeah, I'm at the Golden Crow Bar and Grill. It's a Manity user." The line was silent a moment,

"Well, what is that vile insect doing now?"

"Dirtying the floor." Biorr laughed heartily, the drunkenness giving Jason a smile,

"Fine work," he congratulated, "You deserve a big promotion, but you're not employed anymore." He laughed, his beard scratching on the phone as he laughed himself out of breath, getting to the business: "Any fatalities over there?"

"Yeah, it looks like he lost it right when the nightshift started. It's a mess, I'll need a forensic team to examine the crime scene proper, I'll also need a drug analyst to-" he trailed off, another bout of nostalgia halting his words

"Hello, are you there?"

"Yeah." He sighed, "Just remembered I'm not a cop anymore, I guess it's your call now."

"Well, you're right about that. I'll send a team down right away, get to the bottom of this." Biorr paused, "What about you?"

"I'm working a case at the moment," Jason shrugged, "I just need to find a few things and I'll be on my way. See ya' around, chief."

"Good luck to you, detective." Jason hung up, glancing to the side and noticing some spook with a hundred pounds on the P.I. was outside the booth, snickering to himself and padding a wad in his pocket, the glint of Stonefang Steel at the edge, to which Jason replied with his blue-eyed knight, his palm slapping the ebony gun against the glass with a sharp thud.

One look in Jason's cold grey eyes and the spook went running.

That's the only way to survive in this world, really: carry a bigger gun with a face that says "one missed move and I will fucking shoot your sorry ass", and pray the thug isn't part of the mob.

Jason slid the doors open, heading down the road, already getting his gloves to leave the crime scene unscathed while he searched for clues. Hopefully he'd find some relevant information this time around.

Boletaria.

The Historical district.

The oldest part of the whole city…


End file.
